(*tries not to imagine modern jaws reboot*) (*fails*) (*an elite cadre of genetically-enhanced CGI super-sharks plots to take over the world*) (*there is a gangsta shark, a snooty malfoy shark, a drunken Irish shark, a bro-y fratboy shark, a redneck shark, a beret-wearing french shark, an injun shark with full headdress, etc*) (*the climax of the movie depicts the sharks combining into a huge shark mecha-----------chief brody destroys it by shooting the atom bomb it ate earlier with a gauss rifle*) (*he surfs the resulting tidal wave back to shore while 'click click boom' thunders in the background*) (*then it turns out the whole planet is in fact a giant shark*) (*brody says, 'uh oh---------we got sharkany'*) (*roll end credits*) (*followed next year by 'jaws 2: howl of the cybersharkwolves'*)

boo---------------ten thousand evil spiders in a human suit (*spoiler alert--------the spiders all hate each other, and themselves most of all*)

So I'm watching Twin Peaks right now. I'm a big weirdo that's somehow been more familiar with Lynch's music work than any of his film work so I thought his arguably most famous thing would be a good introduction. I love it. It's so weird and vibrant and you can tell how influential it is on the like weird prestige television that came after. Agent Cooper is such a perfect character. And I really enjoyed season 1.

I'm on the second season now and just watched "Episode 14," which I've heard is one of the high points of the series. I get it. It's some incredible television. Some absolutely haunting stuff, featuring an incredibly brutal scene that I'm shocked got aired as it did on primetime television (especially primetime television almost 30 years ago). Everything comes together in such a brilliant way, and even the lesser plots don't drag the episode down.

I'm just bracing myself for the disappointment, because I heard it falls off massively from here. Understandable since the studio pressured Lynch and Frost into revealing Laura's killer at this point instead of stringing the mystery along like they originally intended. The reveal is so amazing here but with that mystery about to be finished I can see how less of the Laura mystery and more on the weaker plot lines is going to kill this show. I'm just gonna try to force myself through it so I can get to Fire Walk With Me and the new series.

Man, I'll tell you what irritates me, is when a 'joke' has no set-up, no point of reference and no pay-off.

Like...all right. In 'Angry Birds Movie', there's a part towards the end of the movie when the titular Angry Bird is running around in the citadel of the Bad Piggies, searching for the birds' stolen eggs. And so he opens a door, and we get this. A 'The Shining' reference, in a movie for children.

...you know, I understand why it was there. They wanted to put in a joke for the poor parents and uncles who had to sit through this shrieking nonsense with the kiddies, yeah. But it isn't a joke, in any sense. It comes from nowhere, and goes nowhere. It is merely a pop-culture reference, and an entirely inept one, at that (if you remember them ghost girl twins at the Overlook saying 'red rum', you must have been watching a different movie, homey). It's so dang pathetic, man. Why make the effort if you're going to make so little effort.

boo---------------ten thousand evil spiders in a human suit (*spoiler alert--------the spiders all hate each other, and themselves most of all*)

Man alive. I've been rewatchin 'Steven Universe', and I sure like Jasper. She's super tough, and resourceful. She has plans, homey. She's dynamic, and enterprising. How can I not love that, right.

I'll be pretty dang sad if the series ends without her getting saved. I was pretty unhappy when she monstered out in 'Earthlings'. Like...she was interesting. She wasn't strictly a villain, and so her fate kind of bothered me. Especially after what happened between her and Lapis. She just can't catch a break, man.

Like...if Steven ever learns how to fix corruption, uhhhh, Centey first, obviously (almost goes without saying), but then Jasper second. Fix Jasper, man. Fix her. She could be the best good guy, only you gotsta fix her, first.

boo---------------ten thousand evil spiders in a human suit (*spoiler alert--------the spiders all hate each other, and themselves most of all*)

I bought the blu-ray when 'The Last Unicorn' got rereleased couple years back, and they remastered the everlovin out of it.

It looks and sounds so beautiful. I mean, I was here for the story already, and this is just such an upgrade from my stinky old VHS and DVD copies. I can't even tell you. It was my favourite movie before, and now it's a step past mere 'favourite'. Stone the crows.

(EDIT: Gods below. Molly Grue saying ''...no!' when she first sees the Unicorn is pure tragedy.)

boo---------------ten thousand evil spiders in a human suit (*spoiler alert--------the spiders all hate each other, and themselves most of all*)

It was a corny old 90's cartoon, but that's the charm, I guess. I hadn't watched it since I was a little kid, but my 7 year old nephew wanted to check it out. It's surprisingly accurate to the characters, usually video game cartoons make some extreme changes (Mario and Zelda come to mind).

I'm glad Crunchyroll is getting some stuff like this now, I'm pleased with their selection. I wouldn't mind seeing some other 80's/90's cartoons on there, although I'll probably only watch one episode for nostalgia. What I'm not pleased with is the inappropriate commercials on there, a kid shouldn't see perverse trash like Citrus when just trying to watch a cartoon. I'll probably be an old fogie and send in a complaint.

First of all, it was impressively animated, if every episode looked like this the series could have almost been on par with DBZ. My favorite part was the characterization. Showing a reasonable side of Frieza was so cool. I'm glad they didn't just make him good or even neutral, just sort of...agreeable? Idk, but they nailed it because his character wasn't compromised at all like Vegeta's arguably has been. He's still evil, but 1% less so. It seems that he's developed a bit of a sense of camaraderie with the Z Fighters. Jiren wasn't handled as well, he pretty much just suddenly dropped his emo act.

It definitely seemed rushed though, but it seems that a new series may show up next year, at least if the movie and games keep doing well.

I have only very recently poked around some of the arcs of Gintama, at the behest of my girlfriend. This arc was particularly humorous, which was a nice change of pace since I just finished watching one of the more serious arcs the other day. Though Gintama doesn't necessarily have to be watched in any particular order, these episodes may convince me to go back and watch the series from the beginning, though that may be a massive undertaking since it's like a 360-some episode long anime. The humor was great, and Sakamoto again proved to be one of my favorite characters. The interactions between him, Gintoki, and Katsura were overall great, and the idea of the Phantom Fifth Man being some guy from a basketball anime was even better.

I actually also watched the dub of this episode, if only because I really like Sakamoto's dub voice actor. For some reason the sub-par voice for Katsura makes the episode funnier.

saw 12 Angry Men yesterday (the 1957 version). i liked it a lot! there were a lot of interesting decisions in terms of what information was given to the audience and how it was framed. as a character-driven story, it does a great job of juggling 12 very distinct personalities in a captivating way (though some characters definitely get more chances to shine than others).

Following a suggestion on YouTube, I sat down and watched the entirety of "Angels Egg". This **** film is the most beautiful and unique piece of cinema I have ever witnessed. Nothing Disney has every done has matched this film's sheer beauty, and nothing they do ever will. Every single shot is so full of detail and the art style is so unique and cool looking, it's soooooo goooood. The story is... uhm... I don't really know... It's really convoluted and surreal. There is so much weird **** going on every scene, and nothing is ever explained. That's not a bad thing, quite the opposite. I adore how it set up it's story, and despite not giving them names, I loved the characters as well. The entire thing felt "corrupted" and bleak, and the 2 main characters only accentuated this. It feels hopeless, and my god the ending is bizzare. I won't spoil it, but it leaves more questions than it answers. It's world reminds me a lot of Bloodborne, it's got that same sort of "broken beyond repair" feeling, if that makes any sense. Like I said before, the imagery is just fantastic. I have absolutely no complaints with this film, it's **** perfect.

So I watched both Akira and Ghost in the Shell (the original animated film NOT the live action ****).

My thoughts, are as follows.

Akira is a good film with a lot of charming characters, but nowhere near as great as people make it out to be. The visuals are a little off, sometimes characters faces will shrink for no reason, it looks strange and I don't like it very much. I was forced to watch it dubbed, and the dub is not very good. It reminds me of a lot of Saturday morning cartoons like the Super Mario Show and TMNT, that is not a good thing here. The plot I found to be a bit messy, I won't spoil it, but there are 3 characters who switch goals for no reason half way through the film. They go from stopping the main antagonist to helping him and it's never explained why. Despite that, I still thought it was enjoyable and charming. All the characters are interesting and fun, and the ending really ties things together.

Ghost in the Shell I liked a lot better. The animation was stunning, the characters weren't all as interesting as the ones in Akira but it made up for it with a tighter plot. The plot was just fantastic minus the slightly anti climatic ending. Everything was done really well, and it disappoints me this didn't get a true sequel (GITS 2 is a seprate story in the same universe sadly). There isn't as much to say, because besides the ending I had no complaints what so ever.

I watched the two most recent Steven Universe episodes to see what the hype was about. My favorite part of them was before the Big Plot Thing happened tbh

Spoiler.

I just really like Lapis Lazuli as a character so much. I loved the scene with her.

The Big Reveal TM is honestly not a huge shock but the delivery was really good. Although I dunno now I guess that technically makes Steven a Diamond now, and while that's very epic and stuff, I'm not a huge fan of the PROTAG WAS SECRETLY THE CHILD OF (insert godlike being) ALL ALONG!! plot twists so I guess we will see how the series handles it. Anyway, neat beans

So yeah the plot thing was cool but I was more enamored by the unrelated character bit preceding it.

Anyway, I hate how much the art style has changed in a lot of ways. The backgrounds are still gorgeous and the palettes are still lovely but, maybe it's just jarring since I haven't watched in a while, but Amethyst looks like a gremlin now. I know this is one of those overblown annoying criticisms we have all heard way too much but it's a SHAME imo bc one of this show's key attractions to me at the beginning was the visual appeal and I just hate how squat and squashed and unappealingly-proportioned half the cast has become.

Anyway I'm not trying to be a downer, it was definitely nice to remember what I do like about the show and the characters. The world and lore are definitely interesting and have a lot of love put into them. But I've somewhat fallen out of passionate interest and now just kind of passively check in every now and then

(I do still enjoy the show a lot though. honestly maybe my friends just overhyped this development which is why I'm underwhelmed LOL)

OKAY so i actually decided to go re-watch my favorite episode in the series, Ocean Gem, and a couple things:

1. was talking out of my ass above. the proportions and art style is already ridiculously inconsistent and there are gremlin problems in some scenes and people look normal and appealing in other scenes. i think i just notice it more now that people on the internet have complained about it, but i don't actually know that it has gotten any worse.

2. the sequence at the top of the water tower is one of my favorite scenes in, like, anything. it feels dreamlike. the colors are beautiful. the whole premise is like a fairy tale or myth and i love that about it.

3. Lapis Lazuli is my favorite character in this series, and I almost liked her better when she was more of a symbol than a person. In fact, I kind of liked the whole series better when it was more abstract than concrete. I totally understand why it couldn't stay that way; if it was going to have as many seasons as it does, it had to pick up on its ambiguities sooner or later (and flesh out the lore into an overaraching narrative). But I liked how the early series felt more like concepts than something real. I kind of miss that.

this episode overall is 7/10 but just the sequence with the water tower is 10/10